Live Like a Girl with Dr. Mindy Pelz - Unpacking the Health Benefits of Sprouts - With Doug Evans

Episode Date: February 13, 2023

For full show notes, resources mentioned, and transcripts, go to: www.drmindypelz.com/ep160/. To enroll in Dr. Mindy's Fasting membership, go to: resetacademy.drmindypelz.com. In this episode, we dive into what is so special about sprouts. Plus, we chat about amino acids, proteins, and how to break a fast using sprouts.  Doug Evans is an early pioneer in the natural food industry. In 2002 he co-founded Organic Avenue, one of the first exclusively raw, organic, and plant-based retail chains in the country. He then created and founded Juicero, the first fresh, farm-to-glass automatic cold-press juicer, with the mission of bringing more fresh produce to the home. Doug lives in the Mojave Desert at Wonder Valley Hot Springs. Doug wrote The Sprout Book in an effort to teach people about the power of sprouts and has written a transformative plan for sprouting. He's revolutionizing gardening and growing your own food right in your kitchen in an affordable and accessible way. His mission in life is to help people learn how to grow and eat the most nutritious food on the planet, sprouts. Please see our medical disclaimer.

Chia and flax contain the highest amount of plant-based ALA medium chain omega-3 fatty acids. Hey, Dr. Mindy here. And welcome to season four of the Resetter podcast. Have I got a lineup for you this season? Lots of deep thinkers, a lot of brilliant minds, all with one focus to move the needle forward on your mental and physical health. So please know that this podcast is all about empowering you to believe in yourself again. And I want you believing in your body.

I want you believing in your mind. I want you believing in your spirit. If you have a passion for learning, if you're looking to be in control of your health and take your power back, this is the podcast for you. Enjoy. Okay, resetters, on this episode, we are going to dive into the world of sprouts. Now, this is super cool. I'm so excited to bring this conversation to you because this is Doug Evans.

And Doug and I met on a call with Jesse Itzler for his Build Your Life resume group. And at first, when he got on, I was like, Sprouts? Like, really? There's a lot to talk about with sprouts. And after about an hour, I was blown away. by his information. Yet I was really left with some questions like, okay, if sprouts have all these powerful nutrients in them, how does that fit into the oxalate and lectin conversation? And do sprouts really have the same protein amino acid profile as a piece of meat? And so I had all these questions after I left

this initial talk with him and I wanted to bring him on to the Resetter podcast to really dive into where do we use sprouts? Why would we use sprouts? And where do we not use sprouts? So you're going to hear in this conversation, Doug and I dive into what is so special about a sprout and eating a sprout over just a bowl of lettuce? And what do we know about the micronutrients that are in these sprouts? And it's going to be, you're going to be blown away because I was shocked that when you sprout something out of a legume, like a garbonzo bean sprout, you have. You have to be blown away. You have, actually have more nutrients in that sprout than the garbonzo bean itself. So he dives into those nutrients. He talks about the protein profile of a sprout. So we go down that. And then, of course,

we talk about the lectins and oxalates. And that was fascinating too, because what you're going to hear is that there's a little twist to the oxalate level and the lectin level of a sprout. And then, of course, hopefully if you've been following me for a while now, you know that I'm mildly obsessed with amino acids. And so whenever somebody says that a food packs a higher protein content than a piece of meat, I'm a little dubious because I know, and I'm a former vegetarian, but I would say that what I know, based off the nutritional information that I've studied for the last two decades, is that meat has a complete array of amino acids.

So if you're going to eat a sprout that's packed with 20 grams of, protein, is that the same amino acid profile that you get with a piece of meat? This is the detail of conversation we went into. And then you're going to see that we came up with a whole formula for using sprouts to break a fast. It was such a cool conversation. And you will see as the conversation goes on. Like Doug and I were geeking out on each other's work and how to integrate each other's work. And really in full transparency, I went into this conversation thinking I was, not going to come out a Sprout fan and listen all the way through and see if you can tell what side, which team I'm on at this particular moment. So really dense conversation,

totally different than anything I've ever brought you. So welcome to the world of sprouts with Doug Evans. I just want to dive in and this might be the wrong word to use, but I want to dive into the meat of why we need to start to look at the micronutrients that sprouts can really provide us because, you know, what we talked about coming into this conversation, Doug, is just how important getting sprouts into every home from a nutrient level. So my first question to you is, you know, what is it about sprouts and the nutrient power that it punch, the punch that it gives that we can't get in any other food. Why have you, why have you taken this on as your cause? And what is it about sprouts that is really changing

people's health? Yeah. The most important thing was the accessibility to sprouts. Like I lived in New York, L.A., San Francisco for most of my adult life. And then, you know, when I ventured out into nature, into the desert, right? I live in the Mojave desert near Joshua tree. I realized I was also in a food desert. And to grow your own food, it takes weeks or months or years. And sprouts were something that I always knew were nutritious, but I always relegated them as a side dish or as a garnish.

And then here, I was having an existential crisis. What was I going to eat? And so, you know, while staring up at the galaxy and the Milky Way, we have very dark skies here, I saw all the stars twinkling and I got the download for my book, the Sprout book, that three real principles. Number one, sprouts were vegetables. And I always thought of them as a garnish, but they are full on vegetables. And number two, sprouts were vitamins and minerals. So if we think about people taking billions of dollars of vitamin supplements, synthetic, processed, additives, fillers, multivitamins, protein powders. The fact is that you could, if you were to do a blood panel, urine, fecal analysis, microbiome, you could identify where you were deficient or depleted and replete

yourself through the nutrients of sprouts. And if you wanted to get higher concentrations of protein, the legumes, the soy, the garbanzo, the lentils are incredible sources of proteins, and that every single sprout contains every amino acid to become a complete protein. Some more than others, the combination of them make them complete. And so that was really powerful, insightfully, that sprouts were vitamins and minerals. And the third one, which really blew my mind, was that sprouts were medicine. that they had mechanisms and compounds in them that could detoxify benzene from the lungs,

that could kill cancer cells, that could open up the NRF2 pathways, that could create and address inflammation, that could attack early Alzheimer's, that could regulate insulin levels and diabetics. And there was all of this science, nutrition-backed science behind the sprouts, But no one had pulled it all together.

No one went over the top fanatical about sprouts because we live in an affluent convenience culture. So we can go, most people who are affluent can go to a health food store, go to a restaurant, buy online high-quality nutrients. And the poor people aren't worried about nutrition. The poor people are basically, unfortunately, eating fast food, processed food. refined food, you know, and basically developing all of these chronic illnesses. So it was really both corner cases that could need it the most. The middle of the road where people are eating moderately, we don't need fasting as much.

They don't need sprouts as much. They're just, you know, living their mediocre, comfortable life along the way. Yeah, well, you know, my audience knows that health happens in the discomfort. You know, there's that principle of hormetic stressor that we've got to put our, put ourselves in little micro-stressers to be able to grow stronger. So I love that you say that. One of the questions I have for you as an avid salad maker, like, that is one of my superpowers. I make salads every night.

When my kids lived at home, that was, I mean, that was, I always used to say it was my love language to my family. So, but when I looked at what I would put together in a salad, I knew from a microbiome standpoint that a variety of lettuces would be good. So if I could put, you know, kale and I can put the, a spring mix and a rugula and I put it all together that it would have, would give my microbiome a more vast, uh, prebiotic piece to it and feed the good microbes. But I never thought of using sprouts. And I do use sprouts in, in my salads. But I, but I, I never looked at, gosh, when I put together, put sprouts in my salad, not only am I getting more nutrients, but what I just heard you say is I'm also getting protein.

So if we just bring this down to a level of someone wanting to make a salad, are we better off like just taking a bunch of sprouts and putting it next to our meal? Or is, you know, is it have more nutrient power than like arugula, for example? Yeah, I mean, so I stopped buying salad mixes and lettuces years ago, five years ago. So I grow all of my own greens for my salads in the form of sprouts. So if you look on my TikTok at SproutWiz or on my Instagram, I'm just using salads used to be a garnish. Now salads are the center of my plate. So when you talk about diversity, I'm growing six to 12 jars, alfalfa, azuki, radish, clover, broccoli, chia, lentils, fenugreek, all variety of peas. So I'm growing them.

And it's an incredible metamorphosis that occurs. When you take a seed, which looks like a little pebble, right? It's a complete living organism. When you soak it and germinate it, it transforms. into a vegetable and something as simple as a lentil. You're doubling the antioxidant levels. You're tripling the vitamin C. And when the chute comes out and the root comes out,

you're getting bioavailable, soluble and insoluble fiber. So that tender insoluble fiber, you're actually able to feed the microbiome and you're able to extract the water-based nutrition from this cytoplasm. So it's extremely rich. So that's my form of a salad. When you take some of the legumes and you're sprouting the legumes, the lentils, the

garbanzo beans, the mung beans, you're actually removing the phytic acids. You're lowering the lectin levels. You're removing the enzyme inhibitors. And through the rinsing process, right? So the exudate is rinsed away and you're getting like this tender, nutrient dense vegetable. So even like a handful of garbanzo beans is like sprouted garbanzo beans is 20 grams of protein. So you're getting this variety. I've never heard. I think you told me that the last time we talked, but I have never heard that

before. And it's really cool because what we talk a lot about in the fasting movement is that you need to add protein back in to stimulate mTOR. mTOR is muscle growth. So when you go into a fasted state, you're really stimulating autophagy. But on the other side of that is mTOR. And mTOR is growth. And in order to do that, you've got to get 30 grams of protein, specifically at that first meal that you break your fast with. So what I just heard is that you could take, like let's say you're not a vegetarian. Let's say you eat meat.

You could take just a little bit of meat and put some sprouts next to it. And you've now amplified the protein content. Or if you are vegan, you could take. so much of a sprout sprout from a garbonzo bean and you've now got your protein, your 30 grams of protein if you measured it out. Oh my God. We could create, Mindy, this is, I'm so excited. We can create a protein break fast sprouting mix with azuki, with lentils, with green peas, with garbonzo beans, and with soy. Like the best way. to eat soy is sprouted soybeans.

There's no question. Organic sprouted soybeans is the way to eat sprouts. And, you know, there's this other thing that we don't, most people don't talk about in nutrition because it's just too difficult. And that's called living foods, right? So when you're eating something that's living, like when you're eating a normal salad, it's raw, right? It's raw.

It's a leaf of a plant. It's the florette of the plant, but it's been cut away from its root system. So it's actually in the dying and decaying stage. When you're eating a sprout, it's in the life force stage. The root, the shoot, the root hairs, the embryo, the endosperm is all alive. And you're getting this enzymatically rich system, which is part of the active means of when you, you know, in order to activate the sulfurophane from broccoli sprouts, you're taking the broccoli sprouts, which have the isothiocyanates, the glucosinolates, and you mix that with the enzyme morocinase, which is very

volatile. So the compound glucoraphidin is shelf stable, but the enzyme morocinase is volatile, which is why when you cook it, you deplete it. And so if you take that, the little vacuum When you chew them, crush them, freeze them, they mix them together, and you get the active compound sulfurate. So there's this whole science of sprouting, which is incredible, which is why when I moved to the desert, I lived exclusively on sprouts for 30 days. And I felt just so healthy. And now I eat sprouts and fruit because I love my fruits, right? and so that's where I am. So I want to make sure I answered your question, why I'm enthusiastic about sprout.

Yeah, I love it. I love what you're saying. And so let me just make sure that we don't, that I want the listener to really grab what you just said. So when I have a garbanzo bean, well, let's use a chia seed as an example. You can sprout from a chia seed. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's. Yeah. So let's use flax as both of those are prebiotics. Prebiotics and high in ALA. Okay.

So when I sprout them, is there more nutrient in the sprout than the original seed itself? Yeah. There's something magical, right? And it's in nature that if you were to do an assay on a flax seed and you were to look at the water component and you go one plus one, this is what we hear. But if you were to look at those over days of time, you are manifesting and creating new compounds. Like you're literally increasing the volume,

and it's not just water. It's somehow sequestering carbon from the atmosphere, and the stem cells within there are actually growing into their fullest potential, which is why you're doubling and tripling the various compounds inside, the vitamin C, the antioxidants, the fibers. It's growing. And this is occurring without soil, without fertilizer.

Like the energy within the sprouts in the first week, that's the magic of sprouts. My gosh, okay. It's funny because, you know, you and I sat on a panel for Jesse's Build Your Life resume group. And when I heard you speak a couple of years ago, I was like, yeah, that's really solid. Like I hadn't really thought of sprouts like that. But now you're giving me an even deeper understanding of it because I feel like we definitely need to be adding more protein into our diets, especially for like menopausal women and perimenopausal women. But then we also need more nutrients. So what I'm hearing is there's this, this ability to sprout from, from, from

these seeds and these legumes is really a powerful nutrient punch that we don't we can't find another resource to get that same kind of powerful nutrient punch and then what I also just heard that I want to chat about is you take the lectins and oxalates out when you sprout is that is that all I also hear that right yeah well you you reduce the lexins the lectins and you reduce the phytic acid and at the stage there's very low oxalates that are in in the seeds in the sprouts so and you know there's so much misinformation going on like you know i get trolled all the time by people saying plants have defense mechanisms and of course everything has a defense mechanism a carnivore has a defense mechanism teeth and claw, right?

We all have defense mechanism. The defense mechanisms of a carnivore are designed to kill other predators and risk factors. The defense mechanisms in the plants, the predators of the plants are insects. And so when an insect bites into the plant, you know, that glucoraphinin and the morocinase form the sulfurophane, which actually averts the insect and is the defense mechanism. When we consume it, it kills cancer cells. It creates the heat shock proteins. So when you talk about in your work, the hormesis, sprouts create hormesis. So the defense mechanisms in the plants are one of the number one tools you can use for a hermetic

response in the body through the heat shock proteins similar to soaking in a warm bath for 104 degrees similar to fasting and similar to cold plunge okay that that was profound so again i want to break that down here for a moment yeah so because is that because there's a little bit of lectin um going in this is what and i'm just picking that one out when you're eating a sprout it's like a little tiny stress which is what hormesis is, that is causing the microbiome to activate and grow stronger. Is that what I just heard in that? The biological response in the body to broccoli sprouts is actually heat shock proteins. And that is what makes them, you know, there's a peer-reviewed published paper by Dr. Jed Fahey, who's on my scientific advisory board. And his paper on autism,

shows that the broccoli sprouts trigger the heat shock proteins, which lessen the symptoms of autism, right? So that's in a very specific neurological case, but you could easily transfer that into the case of what we're looking for, you know, for the hacking of the body for that, and it translates. So what I'm doing is I'm connecting the dots

on these disparate points to pull them all together. as part of my sprout thesis. And normally when you buy those organic greens in the store for your salads, you may be spending $1 to $2 per ounce, right? When you're growing your own sprouts, you could be spending a dollar or $2 per pound. So you're getting 10x the volume of nutrition through doing a little of the work on your own. Yeah. So when I go, that leads me to one thought I had, which is if I go to my grocery store and I just pull out the little, you know, I can buy sprouts all the time now at my grocery store.

But it's my guess like all other vegetables, the longer it sits there, the less nutrient value it's going to have. So are we better off just growing it at home? I know growing it like in the jar like you talk about and your book talks about is really, you know, makes more economical sense. But in my busy rushing woman lifestyle, if I just grab some from the store, is that going to have the same nutritional punch as if I grow out in a jar? You know, it all depends where you live, right, and who the supplier is. Today, right, on January 11, 2023, there are no national sprout growers, right? So everything is local or regional. So if you live in a city and you're in San Jose, there's a health food store there and they're being grown locally.

They're doing small batches and you go, they're super nutritious and super good. And actually, they're still growing. Even in the refrigerator, they're still growing. So you want to check the expiration date, the grow date. And when you, the sprouts should not smell and they shouldn't be slimy. So if they are crispy crunch, the bright whites like your eyes are all clear, then they're good. And it's valuable. I eat packaged sprouts when I travel frequently.

It's the first thing I do. Like I got this from my buddy Mike Posner. When I go to a hotel now, I'll call the hotel in advance and say, empty the mini bar. No, I want nothing in there but an empty fridge. take out the candy, take out the alcohol, take out the soda. I want an empty refrigerator. And then I go on to Instacart to Whole Foods, and I have them deliver, you know, my sprouts, the greens, you know, some lemon, tahini.

So I'm set up for success when I travel. So shout out to Posner, you know, for coming up with that idea. But that's what I do. So I love packaged sprouts. And it's all a matter of like, if you can afford. Like a little pack of sprouts is $3 to $5 in the health food store. If you grow them on your own, it's 30 cents. But you have to grow them.

So it takes a little time. So it's like, you know, if you want to, if you want instant gratification, you go to a furniture store, they deliver the furniture. You want to have some sweat in the game, Swedish design and engineering. You go to IKEA and you put it together yourself. Right. So in your book, do you talk about how we grow it? Do you give us instructions on how we grow?

My book was like I wrote the Sprout book because I had no clue of what I was doing. So I kept my captain's logs of all of my activity. And turns out you grow chia and flax differently than you grow lentils and mung beans, which is different than alfalfa and broccoli and clover. So there was a variety. So I kept all my logs. Then I did as much research as I could going deep on why to sprout, how to sprout, what are the nutritional benefits and difference characteristics of sprouts?

Like chia and flax contain the highest amount of plant-based ALA medium chain omega-3 fatty acids. And when you combine that, the body can convert ALA into EPA and DHA, but it's not like 100%. It may be between 1 and 10%. But if you're eating it on a regular basis, you will get more than enough ALA to get that. If you just want to cheat a little and boost it, just adding seaweed or plant-based algae, which has the EPA and DHA in it, which is my most frequent recipe that I post, is a nori wrap because the nori has the EPA, DHA omega-3s.

So that's an important part to share. So, okay, what do you say if, you know, where my brain goes with everything you just said is, okay, that works great if you have a good, healthy gut. What if I've been on multiple rounds of Annabye? decades of birth control. My microbiome is a hot mess. Am I going to be able to use sprouts? We know they're prebiotic. We know that they've got all these nutrients. But if my gut is so decimated and so depleted, am I going to still pull those nutrients out? Or is this one of those things that if we do it

over time, we're going to start to rebuild the microbiome and eventually you're getting more and more nutrient absorption as the microbiome changes? Well, I think, you know, you know the answer to that. You do your fasting, all different kinds of fasting, intermittent fasting, 13-hour fast, 24-hour fast, seven-day fast, and you start to clean up your microbiome. And then from the source of nutrition, you want to have soluble and insoluble fiber that's supernutrient that has the phytonutrients. So if you have a crappy microbiome, you have a crappy microbiome, you want to have.

right and you eat sprouts the consequence will be some bloating some flagellation because this is potent medicine and you're eating it if you chew it well right and you stare at literally the same way that if a mother is staring at the baby it starts to lactate right it starts to generate the breast milk for for us we live in a fast fast food culture where we're operating too fast. So if we stop and we stare at the food that we're going to eat, we're staring at the sprouts, we will begin to salivate like Pavlov's dog.

And so the digestion begins with the eyes, translates into the saliva, and then the body is starting to form the digestive energy, flora, enzymes, acids, to help break it down. But if you just take someone, you force feed them some sprouts, it's not going to work as much.

So you could do one of two things. You could start having a sprout salad. You could add some lemon as an assidulant to help break it down and make it available. You can add healthy fats like olives to it. I'm more of a proponent of whole fats, Like I'll buy coconut, old coconut, and I'll eat the coconut for a fat. I'll eat avocados for a fat.

I will eat olives for fats, so I won't do oils because I think you're stripping away the phytonutrients and the fiber, but I want the fat. So I love high-quality fats in their whole form. Great, yeah. Yeah, it's a great. And then now, you know, if you just take the olive, the olive is so rich in polyphenols. And so you're taking that polyphenol and you're combining it with the prebiotic power of the sprout. And you, I mean, from a microbiome standpoint, that's, that's

absolutely brilliant. And the other thing I want to point out that I don't think you and I have talked about is the idea, I actually sat and interviewed multiple times, Stephen Gundry, on the oxalate and lectin issue. And I wanted to hear from the horse's mouth. I had one question for him. And this was the question. If I have a healthy microbiome, are oxalates and lectins are they my enemy? Like, if I have a good microbiome, do I need to avoid plants? And he's like, of course not. He went all into this whole thing about everybody took the plant paradox to an extreme and that we have to look at integrating plants for a variety of reasons. But what I love about what you said is that we have this reduced lectin piece that is going to create this hormetic stressor in the gut.

And part of why I asked you the question was I want people to understand that if you start to branch into sprouts like you're recommending, if you get bloated, if you get constipated, that's a good thing because that's telling you that the body needs to repair itself. So stick with it. Combine it with fasting to your point. Thank you for noticing and pointing out that fasting is so powerful. microbiome because that's one of my my passions to get to the world that I I'm thinking if we take fasting and we break it with the with the sprouts that is and a longer fast like a 24 hour fast

breaking it with the combination of sprouts you just mentioned we have a complete microbiome repair system at that point absolutely I mean this is something that you know one of my biggest proponents is Dr. B who wrote fiber-fueled, right? And so he's a gastroenterologist who's, you know, he's had sprouts in both of his books. And, you know, like that was a big concern. And he's on that specific level. So I'm glad you, you know, asked Dr. Gundry about that because, you know, a lot of people ask that. And people just don't know. And, you know, like, I'm glad also I love that you're hearing salads because the carnivores, I think that the, I love meat, right? I ate meat every day, you know, from, you know, the time I was weaned till I was 33 years old.

I ate meat chicken fish every day. I ate raw meat. I ate steak tartar. I ate raw eggs. And then, you know, this was well before I even heard about the APOB gene, right? or LDL cholesterol, I watched, right, physically, my aunt get diabetes and they had to chop off both of her feet below her ankles. And the misnomer is we think diabetics, you know, diabetes is caused by sugar. No, diabetes is caused by insulin resistance. So if you're overweight and you can

get overweight by eating a variety of different things, but in particular, I remember my aunt, would eat, you know, a lot of meat, right? And then a lot of processed carbs. And consequently, she had both of her feet amputated below her ankles and then died the same year, which is a younger age than I am right now. And so I watched that. Then I watched my uncle get heart disease and die. My mother got stomach cancer and died.

And my father got heart disease and died. And my brother has developed type 2 diabetes, atrial fibrillation, became overweight, obese, and has had three strokes and a heart attack. And just two weeks ago over Christmas, he had to go spend seven days in the hospital getting a cardio aversion which failed, and then they had to do an ablation on his heart. So I was surrounded by these lifestyle-induced diseases. And that's when I had this consciousness of everything I'm going to feed myself is going to be high quality nutrition. I went down this path totally objectively.

And it was hard for me to give up the things that I love. My mouth still waters the smell of rosemary chicken, right? I still get excited when I see a medium red steak, right, like a T-bone or something. But under no circumstances, will I? I go there because I'm aware of the consequences. I would have to say just on that lifestyle piece that I am a big fan of meat. I think, and I love the idea of taking the best that the plant world has to offer and the best that the animal world has to offer. And how do we bring it together?

I am not a fan of absolutes. But when we look at meat and we look at what's killing people, it's the toxic. It's the hormones they're putting in the meat and the toxic part of growing an animal, killing an animal, and then eating it, we've got all those toxins that are involved in that. And that's part of the major issue. When it comes to the amino acid profile of sprouts versus meat, so I don't want to leave the meat conversation. Because I feel like it's easy for us. again, we look for absolutes in health care.

And I'm trying to get everybody out of the absolute lane because once we start saying plants are bad, meat's bad, we've taken bio-individuality out of the picture. And everybody's microbiome and genetics are going to tell you you need different foods. So when we look at 20 grams of protein in a, however, let's say a cup of sprouts, and we compare that 20 grams of protein to meat, is it the same amino acid profile because that matters for neurotransmitter production and hormone

production well it's interesting when you're getting it from meat right it's theoretically all there meat is a complete protein if you want to if you're eating enough calories and you're eating enough variety of sprouts or other vegetables you are getting a complete protein unequivocally. Like I'm 56 years old, right? I have absolutely no protein deficiency. My blood work is pristine. And so I'm seeing the effect of doing it. But what happens is, you know, people basically attempt to emasculate people who are eating plants. And there's this association, not with you, but there's association with eating meat. It's like masculine, you know, liver king.

Right? In the health world, it's very much like that right now. And the reality is, you know, it's the consequences of, you know, sustainable living, right? So I look at what can we do sustainably, right? What can we do to feed the world? And when we have a situation today, which is like it's starting to bring me to tears, I'm going into my feminine right now, but we have 10,000 people a day dying of starvation,

dying of starvation, right? And for every calorie that's grown of plants, 10 calories are fed to animals, right, who are living like this, this hellacious life. And then we have the depletion, depletion of, natural resources and the like. So in a way, if we're thinking about, you know, all, right, all people, all creatures on the planet, that's where, you know, I'm not going to tell other people what to do, but I will say that it takes 1,500 gallons of water to prepare one pound of beef. And you can prepare one pound of sprouts with one gallon of water.

Like, think about that. They have 1,500 gallons of water versus one gallon of water. And look, I encourage you to, have you researched the APOB biomarker and the APOG genes? I will tell you that I have not. And let me tell you why. Because I believe in epigenetics. And I've recently been aligning with the founder of the DNA. company who is looking at genetics from a functional level.

Because to me, our genetics should tell us what we give us an idea about our lifestyle. So to your point, with that gene, you know, it can give us an idea about what lifestyle we should live. But I don't believe that if my father has, you know, cardiovascular disease, and that's in my genetics that I'm predisposed to having cardiovascular disease. I believe I can change my lifestyle and that's going to affect my genetic outcome. So that's why I don't put a lot of attention on genes. Yeah, I 100% agree with you.

Like I feel like I thought that I was genetically cursed and through my lifestyle. Right. I cold plunge every day at 37, 38 degrees. I sit for up to an hour in a. a natural mineral hot spring at 108, 109 degrees, where I'm trying to increase my body temperature by one degree centigrade. And I'm eating stressors and plant-based.

So I have distanced myself from any concern of the genes. But I'm looking at a level of health sustainability that what can we do? And also, look, I lived in a tent for three years until I got married. And then when my wife came, she lived in the tent with me for eight months. And then we finally got a house.

And now we have a child. So we're living a more pedestrian life, but small and austere. When I was living in the tent and in nature, no TV, no cable, intuitively, when I had an abundance of sprouts, right, just an abundance of sprouts, I felt so complete in my life that I didn't have this lacking.

I didn't have this neurosis or the cravings. They were all averted. So I think there's a psychological benefit to doing that. Yeah. What I was thinking as you were just talking over the last like 20 minutes is that, you know, again, if we go back to the plant-based animal-based argument, I'm just going to call it an argument, not that we're, having, but that the world is having, is what I just learned about sprouts is it sort of threads

a different needle because one of the arguments of the carnivore people is that, well, you can't get enough protein in vegetables. And what I just heard from you is, well, sprouts are immune from that. They've got more protein than other typical vegetables. And then I also feel like then one of the, the, the, um, arguments is, well, it's not a complete protein. And what I just heard is actually sprouts are a complete protein. Oh, yeah. So yeah, I think that's a, it's a different, it's almost like it shouldn't go in the vegetable category or even in the plant category, even though I know it needs to go there, needs to go in like a superfood category. Yeah. But I mean, I think the thing is the, the, the idea of the carnivore diet is sexy and, you know,

and fatty and definitely masculine to be in the carnivore diet. The idea that, you know, major global health organizations around the world have come to the conclusion without like gun to their head, right? Vegans aren't pointing guns and daggers at them, that you can be at any stage of life from, you know, infant, first food, through geriatric care, all stages of life that you could eat 100% plant-based, do it. So there's no question on the nutrition level. Now, there's a major difference between someone who's eating whole food, plant-based, mostly raw, lots of sprouts, lots of, you know, cultured food and nutrients versus someone that's eating, you know,

vegan macaroni and cheese, vegan Oreos, soda, processed food, you know, these like plant-based burgers that who knows where they came from. Like, yeah, I mean, there's such a difference. And that's where, you know, to me, I'm not telling people what to do, right? I'm inviting them to the possibility of adding sprouts to their diet from a complete level, adding a little few sprouts to the fact that I right now, you know, just, I don't even know how it happened, but people are taking this, like, taking the sprouts and running with them, right? And that's what happened on social media, you know, where I have 25 videos on. on TikTok that have over million views on TikTok where people are trying and the messages that I'm getting is that they're eating spouts all the time. They're losing weight. They're gaining it. They're sharing it. They're growing. You know, like so much content is coming up. And then,

you know, people like, oh, it's got to taste good. Right. And I got to tell you, raw meat doesn't taste good. Raw kale doesn't taste good unless people season it, they cook it, they process it, they flavor it. And as a matter of fact, sprouts taste as good, if not better, than any other vegetable. And you can even make spices. Like if someone likes spicy food, like the mustard sprouts, the radish sprouts, even the broccoli sprouts, can have a big kick to them. And you almost have to neutralize them with a healthy fat, like a tahini or an avocado. Yeah. What, you know, one thought I had is the one of the arguments for carnivore is that it, when you go solely carnivore, you, you stimulate T regulatory cells in the gut. And T regulatory cells will balance the immune system out. So carnivore has been insanely great for people with autoimmune conditions. Now, what I'm wondering is with this lower lectin level of a sprout, if you, if, you know, if, you know, again, we're putting the sprouts into a different category.

But I don't think a purely sprout diet is going to have that same T regulatory effect. But what I am learning in this conversation is it's not going to have the inflammatory effect or the immune response that like something that's dense, like kale, you know, everybody seems to hate kale is going to have in the gut. So do we know what the difference is around the T-regul? cell and the immune response. But it's interesting, even, you know, Mr. Carnivore MD, you know, as of February of 2022 is saying carnivores need to eat fruit, right? And so he's having all sorts. Right.

Yeah. Agree. You know, so, so what happens is, you know, what I can tell you is in isolation, right, the benefit of the carnivore diet is, if you can, you can't. can get someone just to eat meat, they're eliminating all of this crap, right, and they're giving their gut a chance to heal. But there haven't been long-term studies, long-term research, over, you know, the impact on the gut, beyond the regulating of the T-cells, over time, what will happen, especially with the deficiency of phytonutrients, micronutrients, polyphenols,

bioflavinoids, the prebiotics. It's, you know, these things, you can have an effect, like any major shift, you know, away from processed food is going to have a positive effect on the body, right? I think that we don't know about carnivore. I can just tell you that my gut, which is very clean, operating at a high level, my intuition is very, very powerful. I can tell you my gut says that when I see a cow, I want to go pet it. Like I don't want to chew on its eyeballs, eat all four of its stomach, chew on its bone marrow,

you know, eat the blood. It just, it feels like there was a time that meat was sensationalized as the food of the wealthy. And I can tell you, as soon as I made my first. like paycheck where I made $1,000 in New York City. I went to a steakhouse, Peter Lugar's, and I ordered the biggest steak, because that was the recognition, the status of arriving financially, et cetera.

And as I became more self-aware, more in-tuned, I felt like I can get my protein and all nutrient requirements from eating a and my diet is 100% plant-based, mostly raw, mostly sprouts, fruits, seaweeds, et cetera. If I eat seeds and nuts, I soak them, germinate them, and low-temperature dehydrate them. So I'm removing the enzyme inhibitors and making them a more bioavailable. And again, I don't want people to lose that nuance that you're, the way you're going about making the sprouts, the soaking of the seeds, all of that is so important for getting rid of the components to these things that could possibly create any kind of gut dysbiosis.

The other real important question that I want to have with you, or dialogue I want to have with you, is do we have any examples of somebody able to build muscle on a sprout-filled diet. And because I want to go back to this idea that protein serves many purposes and the amino acid breakdown is really important. But a lot of my following is women over 40. And as we go into menopause and our ovaries are not producing sex hormones anymore, all of a sudden, the job of making sex hormones gets handed over to the adrenals. And what I found is that a lot of women, when they are adrenal fatigued, their body will break down muscle in order to get those nutrients to be able to make the sex hormones, allow the sex hormones to be produced from the adrenals.

So I say all that to say muscle wasting is a major, major problem for women as they move through menopause. Do we have any idea of what sprouts could do to build muscle? Mindy, 2023 is going to be the year of sprouts unleashed. Okay. So let's make a note to have a follow-up the end of this year. And we're going to have like I'm personally working with, I'm coaching,

I'm supporting people. You're going to see the fittest, most ripped, strong bodies that are sprout-based and unleashed. So you're going to see it. I'm even motivated. Like I haven't been a gym rat since I was 17 years old, right? But now, like, I'm going to start unleashing myself and everyone around me.

And you're going to see incredible amounts of protein and superior strain from a sprout forward diet. Brought forward. I love it. So here's my commitment to you, Doug, is that I'm going to go back to our membership academy. that has thousands of menopausal women in it. And I'm going to bring what I just learned. And we'll try practicing an experimenting with breaking our fast with sprouts. And then we'll start integrating it and see what we're noticing as far as muscle strength as well.

And I agree. Let me do that with them for the next six months. And then let's report back and see what we notice. Yeah. And I'm happy if you want, and I'm happy to just volunteer my services. if you want me to zoom in or participate or share information, and I will go back and I'll formulate and help come up with a break fast, sprout protein mix to help people when they come off of a water fast

or they come off of intermittent fasting, sprouts would become the first food that they eat. Love it. Let's do it. I will take you up on that. That would be amazing, that formula, and then we'll definitely bring you into the community. So I love where this conversation went. So let me let me look up with this question. So this is totally in another category. But I love talking to you, Doug, and I want to respect your time. And this has just been amazing.

This year, every year I pick a theme for the Resetter podcast. And this year, I've picked the idea of self-love. And I find that a lot of times we don't love on ourselves enough. So do you have a practice around? self-love where you say kind things to you, to yourself, that you take amazing care of yourself. And then the other question to that, I know, this is a good one, is what are some of your superpowers? Like, you know, what do you think you is a really incredible attribute that you bring to the

world? I mean, I love these questions. I feel like I'm writing these questions for you to ask me. And that's what I'm talking about, my intuitive manifestation, quality. Okay? like Jessica was giving me the Heisman like nine months or a year until we got on here and I persisted until I succeed. So one of my superpowers is I am persistent, right? There's no question, right?

If I think about love, in one of the mantra type information that I share with my five-month-old baby every day, I recite her a whole chapter and verse on love. And one of them, and I'll just go right into the middle of it, because I don't want to take six minutes and do the whole soliloquy. But I'll greet this day with love in my heart. And most of all, I will love myself. For when I do, I will zealously inspect all things that enter my body, my mind, my soul, and my heart. never will I overindulge the request of my flesh rather I'll cherish my body with cleanliness and

moderation never will I allow my mind to be attracted to evil and despair rather will uplift it with the knowledge and wisdom of the ages and so this is part of the thing that I'm saying to myself every day I'm sharing it with my daughter and self-love I do the ice bath I live and soak in the hot springs. I do my running. I look at everything that I put in my mouth as a life for death decision. Life or death decision. So I am eating the highest quality nutrients on a per calorie basis. And only now that I am coming into 2023 unleashed. Like I am going to share this message with the world. I'm going to live it and I'm experiencing it. And this is the perfect time. Like, if we would have done this podcast six months ago, I would not be as tuned in to where we are right now.

I love it. I love it. You know, the other thing I was thinking is sprouts. Eating sprouts is self-love, you know? Like, you're passionate for sprouts and how you eat sprouts is a form of self-love. And I want people to understand what you just said is so powerful. When we take amazing care of ourselves, we are not depriving. ourselves. We're actually telling our bodies how much we love it. And so therefore, I care about

your bodies so much that I'm going to feed you the right food. I'm going to hang around the right people so my thoughts are right. I'm going to make sure that I put myself in environments where I can grow physically, spiritually, and emotionally in a real positive way. To me, that's self-love. Absolutely. And think about that you get to grow your own food, that you are co-creating with nature. This food is high quality nutrition. Tell me where people, so my audience knows where to find you. And I, you know, I hope everybody goes out and gets the book, but you're on a bigger mission than just what you wrote in the book. So how do people find you? So I'm on Instagram at my name, Doug Evans, D-O-U-G, E-V-A-N-S. I'm on TikTok at Sprout-W-I-Z. And you could sign up for my

newsletter at the sproutbook.com, you know, and I'm just sharing information and resources. And that's it. Very simple. And I answer most DMs, anything that's not any, like, like I've had trolls that I don't have a time to answer in depth all trolls, but I can tell you that dozens of people that were antagonistic about you have to eat meat, you know, you don't look healthy, et that I took the time to give them more love, right, as opposed to hate and snarkiness, are now sprouting.

Like I could show you the thread where someone came with a snarky comment and now they are sprouting and they're thanking me that I've changed your life. You know, they apologize for being a knucklehead, you know. And so like that's, it's amazing transformation. Well, keep up the amazing work, Doug. we're going to do an experiment in my reset academy. I'll come back to you and let you know how that goes. We'd love to have you come and chat with them, so we'll set that time up. But I just, you know, you and I have chatted about this before. Like, I love people on a mission to bring something

a really good message to the world and that's what you're doing. So thank you so much, Doug, for being here. I really appreciate you. Thank you so much for joining me in today's episode, I love bringing thoughtful discussions about all things health to you. If you enjoyed it, we'd love to know about it. So please leave us a review, share it with your friends, and let me know what your biggest takeaway is.